“Illegal Still in
Alabama”
Harper’s Weekly, March 2,
1867
It being generally
imagined that whisky is one of the necessaries of life,
it could hardly be expected that the chivalric native
of the South should deprive himself of the inebriating
fluid. Now to buy whisky that has paid a profit to half
a dozen dealers is more expensive than brewing it. Then
the aforesaid native has a constitutional objective to
government taxes, and a large one is gathered from the
sale of spirits. Hence the still carries on contraband
distillation in many a quiet nook of the Southern
States. The sketch is from one of these.
